Texas making changes to DKR-Texas Memorial Stadium to help pay for new practice facility

Next time you’re in Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium, you may notice some changes on the west side of the home of the Longhorns.

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Texas is renovating several critical components of Bellmont Hall, the part academic facility, part upper deck seating for the 105,000-person football stadium. One of the more visible changes will be the addition of a number of luxury suites built into the seventh and eighth floors that overlook Campbell-Williams Field.

Here’s the first look at construction inside DKR’s west side — 9 new suites that’ll cost $10 million each where the press box used to be. Yes, they’re already sold out. Press moving to south end zone corners. More tonight in CDC’s Town Hall. pic.twitter.com/EzePEWPy51

— Brian Davis (@byBDavis) February 27, 2025

Funds from these suites will help the athletic department pay for the brand new Football Practice Facility located between the Recreational Sports Center and the Jamail Swimming Center on San Jacinto Blvd. just south of DKR. Construction has begun on the site of the old School of Social Work, and the practice facility is scheduled to be opened in 2026.

“One of the things we looked at is how are we going to fund part of our project, which is the indoor,” Texas athletics director Chris Del Conte said last week at his athletics town hall. “That indoor project was critical to us. So we’re putting brand new suites up there. We’re redoing the seventh floor of Bellmont Hall. We’re calling them Bellmont Legends. Not bad, really. They’re our founders. We have 10 families who have come in and were really receptive to creating an incredible space that we can then revamp.”

Fifty-yard-line suites and premium areas are not some new development at Texas Memorial Stadium. Suites and an upper deck were added to the east side of the stadium in 1997, just in time for Ricky Williams‘ final two years in Austin. In addition, the North End Zone added 2100 club seats and 47 suites upon completion in 2008 on the heels of a national championship run. And a few years ago, the South End Zone facility added several suites beside the new video boards plus a field level stadium club along with needed changes to the Moncrief-Neuhaus Athletic Center.

These suites, like ones serving similar purposes at Alabama’s Bryant-Denny Stadium and Texas A&M’s Kyle Field, will help to offset the cost incurred by the new practice facility.

“Why those suites are important is because we’re building a brand new indoor practice facility for our football program and an underground parking garage,” Del Conte said. “That parking garage will be used for our student-athletes, about 500 spaces, but on gamedays it will be turned over for our fans to use. A partnership with Allan Cole and the School of Social Work is building an incredible facility.”

Del Conte mentioned that the athletic department was making a $10 million gift to Texas’ Steve Hicks School of Social work, a sensible trade for the space once occupied by the old University Junior High that the School of Social Work utilized.

Those suites will replace areas reserved for the writing press and the visiting athletic director. Texas will build media centers in the South End zone near the current locations of the flagpoles that hoist the United States and Texas flags during games. Portions of these spaces were once occupied by the Longhorn Network set and TV sets for shows like ESPN’s College GameDay and Fox’s Big Noon Kickoff.

That’s not all that the athletic department is doing with Bellmont Hall. The entire second floor and much of the first has been renovated in recent months dating back to before the 2024 football season. Del Conte said they were renovating the entire department of kinesiology, updating classrooms, lecture halls, and more for the School of Education.

Del Conte said again that once the Football Practice Facility is complete, then the hope is to put a natural grass surface down on Campbell-Williams Field. The football program’s needs, plus other uses like practice for the Showband of the Southwest and events like commencement prevent grass from currently being feasible. Del Conte has pointed toward his time at TCU when explaining why Campbell-Williams Field remains artificial, mentioning that just about the only event that can take place on a grass football field in the stadium is a football game. As it stands now, Texas has other needs.

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Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium has undergone a significant amount of changes as it begins its second century of service. The changes are ones the athletic department hopes can make Longhorn football successful thanks to the new facility it will have to conduct practice.